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Retribution/Craftworld Ulthwe Pack
The Craftworld Ulthwe Pack is a Dawn of War II: Retribution multiplayer DLC. It adds the Ulthwé, a major Eldar Craftworld, as a multiplayer Army Painter color scheme with customized models and textures. The Craftworld Ulthwe Pack was released for the 3.16.1 patch for $7.49 (€5.99, £4.99) on July 19, 2011. The DLC was updated with reworked portraits (for some units) in the 3.18 patch on October 20, 2011. Relic commentary :The below commentary on the design of the DLC pack was posted on the official blog by Relic Entertainment artist Matt Kuzminski. Ulthwé Craftworld Ulthwé sits near the Eye of Terror, like the Cadians of the Imperial Guard they stand ever vigilant against the influx of Chaos in all its guises. Their proximity to the Eye is rumored to have exaggerated the psychic abilities of the Seers and Warlocks of Ulthwé. Further credence is given to this rumor by the disproportionate amount of Seers to all other Aspects. Farseer When we started talking about doing a race pack for Eldar, we were all pretty excited about the idea of bringing Farseer Taldeer from Dark Crusade back. She is mentioned throughout DoW2 and we consider her one of our signature characters from the DoW franchise. I quickly pulled the model up and started to see what it would take to bring the design into the DoW2 and current Games Workshop style. It was pretty apparent that the Eldar had evolved and Taldeer’s design from back in the Dark Crusade days didn’t really fit. Talking with Games Workshop confirmed those suspicions, but they did give us the freedom to design something inspired by Taldeer. I borrowed some design elements from the variety of miniatures, but drew from Taldeer for the black face mask and backpack spines. Adding the Eye of Isha to the helmet crest was a successful bit of inspiration. The Rune patterns on the backpack and the sash were also interesting challenges to keep them consistent with the Eldar visual language. The Farseer model is the signature piece of this race pack and a nice piece of craftworld-distinct art. But is it Taldeer? I like to think that no one’s really sure who’s behind that mask. Warlock Commander One of the nicest pieces of art we have for the Eldar, he got kitted out with some new robes and a new helmet pattern. The iconic Ulthwe patterns on the helmet gives him a unique look on the battlefield. His overall textures were given a pass to clean them up and work better with the black and white aesthetic. Seer Council We wanted a distinct look for the Warlocks of the Seer Council. I’ve always really liked the idea of a fur cloaks on the warlocks to give them a bit of a raw, warrior aesthetic. They also get a new helmet with a topnknot and some new runes on his robes. The Autarch and the Black Guardians The Autarch is one of my favourite characters. The wings, the bombastic arrival… we had to give her something distinct for this pack. Where the seer path is emphasized by patterns of white on black, I wanted the language of infantry to be more dangerous and militaristic. The Ulthwe are known for their large standing army of superlative Black Guardians, so the Autarch and Guardians both have a clean, black look with red highlighting. The helmet for the Autarch is unique in DoW2 to this race pack, while her wings have a distinctive red shimmer. For those with keen eyes, the Eye of Isha rune is worked into the face masks of the Black Guardians. As well, the guardian textures have been cleaned up for some added contrast and sharpness. Falcon and Fire Prism The distinct lightning pattern and red edge highlighting was inspired directly by the Fire Prism model in the Games Workshop Eldar Codex. The Warp Spider Commander We put a helmet on him, because we wanted to keep all the commanders features more mysterious. The Wraithlord This was a very exciting piece to do. Games Workshop gave us some of the original sketches used to design the miniature, and using those we crafted a distinct new look for the Wraithlord. The Wraithlord depicted on the cover of the Eldar codex was the starting point, with some elements derived from the original concept sketches from Games Workshop. The lightning designs on the pauldrons and tassets were another bit of inspiration from a ForgeWorld model. A few notes for clarity... I hope you like this DLC. There are a good number of people who took time out of their busy schedules to help put this together. To those who gave up a few hours of their evenings to make the Ulthwe DLC pack look as good as it did, you have my thanks. Gallery Dow2r ulthwe dlc 01.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 02.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 03.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 04.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 05.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 06.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 07.jpg Dow2r ulthwe dlc 08.jpg Craftworld Ulthwe Pack